


hold fast, drifting

by fruitwhirl



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: 1st - s4 finale spec, F/M, prompt fics
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-05-22
Updated: 2017-06-05
Packaged: 2018-11-03 13:42:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,826
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10968411
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fruitwhirl/pseuds/fruitwhirl
Summary: After they fall to earth, after they lose and find each other over and over again, Bellamy thinks that Octavia's going to be the hardest thing he’s ever going to have to lose. And oh god, he can’t believe he’s wrong.//a collection of tumblr prompts





	1. the subtle aches with the weather change

**Author's Note:**

> hi my name's emily and i'm a total Blarke. i've got a couple of prompts that were sent to my tumblr, so i'm gonna be posting them here also. title of entire work is from "diver" by kid astray. title for this chapter is from "atlas: touch" from sleeping at last! enjoy!
> 
> this episode: "bellarke + 'I just really need to have you here right now'"
> 
> includes some spoilers for s4 finale that were based on leaked scripts from a long time ago, pure spec and not very good science.

When Bellamy was seven years old, his mother’s muffled screams filled the small, metal compartment that he called home, and then it was the soft cries of a newborn girl he named after an old emperor’s sister, a woman who stood tall and strong against all odds. He hoped that his Octavia could do the same, even if she had to live her entire life in fear of being discovered, of being criminalized for her birth.

After they fall to earth, after they lose and find each other over and over again, Bellamy thinks that she’s going to be the hardest thing he’s ever going to have to lose. And _oh god,_ he can’t believe he’s wrong.

 

 

 

In all honesty, Bellamy _knows_ that something is going to go wrong. He’s well aware that Raven and Monty have analyzed every possible problem (and have very little chance of overcoming thing), but it’s Clarke that he’s worried about. For once, she’s hopeful that it’ll all work out, that she can save her friends (that she can save _him_ ) and while he doesn’t want to put his faith into a patchwork plan, her optimism, her insistence that they will survive—that _he_ will survive—has crept past the barriers he’s put up, past the pain he still feels from the trigger she couldn’t pull.

More than anything, he hopes that she’s right and that they’ll find their way out of this.

An hour before they’re supposed to launch, Clarke has pulled him into the office that hangs above the rest of the lab, watching over the area below like an impartial observer. She lamely gestures for him to sit next to her on the couch, her movements so feeble it’s like she’s conserving her energy.

Then, she turns toward him, lays her hand gently—briefly—on his forearm, proceeds to tell him a list of various instructions, that all range from how to get the oxygenator to start to the best course of action in case if someone gets cut or injured while in zero gravity.

When she pauses to take a breath, her eyes flit back up to him, and there’s something heavy he hasn’t seen since they arrived at the bunker: acceptance. He takes that opportunity, the moment that she’s quieting in order to regain her thoughts, and places his large hands over her own, rubs his thumb against hers, and hears her sharp intake of breath.

“Clarke, you’re going to be in that rocket with me. You can tell me the rest of this then.” He knows what she’s going to say, and he can’t let her say it. So he pushes on. “You’re going up there, you’re going to _live,_ especially if I have anything to do with it.”

He’s accepted losing people: Jasper, one of the original delinquents, Octavia, even. But he can’t lose her. He can’t lose Clarke.

“If it comes down to it, I have the best chance of survival, I’m not letting any of them die, Bellamy. I can’t do it. Not again. I did it with the City of Light, I was going to do it in the bunker, and I did it with the list and—”

“ _We_ made that list. Clarke, do you know how many of _our_ people I probably sentenced to death.” The last part aches, sinking into a deep part of his soul. His fingers move to the smooth inside expanse of her wrist, where he feels her pulse slowly pick up in intensity.

“They _all_ would have been dead, Bellamy. If I had kept that stupid door closed like I wanted to, they _all_ would be dead. _Your sister_ would be dead,” she chokes out, the words seeming to rip apart her throat with every syllable. “I can’t let anyone else die because of me.”

He knows he should still be angry, and he thinks that there’s always going to be a small part that’s too scarred to forgive her for what she’s done, but he’d rather be with her than without her, so he tells her so. “You’ve done shitty things and so have I. And I’m not gonna sit around while you deem yourself expendable.”

“ _Bellamy_ —”

It’s then that he hugs her, that he wraps himself around her so tightly that for a moment, he’s worried that she won’t be able to breathe. But she responds quickly, her arms moving around to encircle his waist, and his lips are in her hair, and he exhales a sigh of relief, because maybe he’ll be able to convince her that her life is worth saving just as much as ( _more than_ ) everyone else’s. And maybe he’s trying to convince himself of that too, that he deserves to live just as much as she does.

And after it feels like Praimfaya should have broken them apart so long ago, he loosens his grip on her, pulls back slightly only press his mouth against her forehead, hard, and then to wrap himself back around her frame, tucking her head underneath his.

Turns out, it’s not the apocalypse directly that forces them away from each other, but Raven.

She stands in the doorway, leaning against its frame for support, panting.

“Guys, we’ve got a problem.” Her breathing’s heavy, and she worries her lip. Clarke immediately stands, Bellamy not far behind her. “The reactor’s missing.”

 

 

 

When they find out what happens to it, it’s almost too late. Echo, it seems ( _god,_ he can’t believe he trusted her for a moment), couldn’t handle the possibility of going up into space, even if it saved her life. From inside the lab, they spot her at the top of the radio tower, clutching the small but crucial piece of machinery in her hands.

None of them are wearing their helmets, and they’re too far away and god she’s going to drop it and destroy the one thing that can save them, but then it’s a blonde streak and she’s running out in her stupid patchwork suit and without a helmet, even though the storm is less than an hour away, and by some miraculous reason, Clarke catches the reactor before it crumbles into millions of pieces.

But then it’s _her_ that crumbles, falling to her knees, and Bellamy’s heart stops and barely registers the heavy helmet that’s being thrust into his hands and he puts it on and races out there, only to see Echo, similarly crumpled on the snow, the protective glass shattered and sticking against her skin that’s being covered in boils.

He doesn’t spend another moment on her, though, instead directing his attention to the small blonde that’s curled up in a ball, gathering her up into his arms because she can’t seem to move. She’s flush against his chest, and he can’t feel the rise and fall of hers, and so he sprints, faster and with more determination than he figures is possible, to the doors of the lab.

She was supposed to have nightblood, even if it was untested, it was supposed to be their fail-safe, and as she’s writhing on the floor and her skin breaks out in hives, Bellamy decides that he really, really hates Earth, and the fact that it’s done this to her.

“Get the reactor,” Raven shouts, and Bellamy can’t move, and so it’s Monty that rips it from her clutches, and then they get to work and the only thing he can do is stand there.

And then, because of _course_ it’s gonna happen now, the computer coolly states in Becca’s cool voice that there’s “Five minutes to launch.”

Everything’s moving so fast and yet so slow, he doesn’t even realize that he’s crouched down next to Clarke, his hand in her hair, until Raven shouts at him for something that he doesn’t process. He doesn’t know if the nightblood concoction that Abby made works, because they only had tested it yesterday, for a few minutes, when the radiation wasn’t so bad. Again, Raven yells at him, pained because she knows that they can’t do anything for her right now, and that jolts him out of his stupor.

In the end, they have thirty seconds left to get into the rocket, and Clarke is too far away. He runs towards her anyway, because _he doesn’t know what he’d do without her,_ and then there’s something, someone, that holds him back.

“I’m not letting you let us die again, Bellamy. It’s too late!” Murphy is steadfast, but Bellamy can hear the hurt in his voice just as well as he feels it in his heart. He’s just about to tell him to _let go, then, and let him stay_ when he feels another set of arms, and then another, dragging him back into the Vesta and his fight dies when the doors closes, his view of Clarke diminished, and the ship begins to shake.

It takes off, and Bellamy cries.

 

 

 

They’ve reached the very edge of the stratosphere when Bellamy’s regained his ability to speak.

The rest of the crew is quiet around him, waiting for him to say something.

And he does. It’s low, but he remembers as he mutters, “I can’t believe I left her,” that they can hear him through the comms. Harper reaches over then, in comfort.

“It’s not your fault,” she says, but he knows the truth. _He left her._

 

 

 

It’s a few minutes later, though, that the storm hits and he hears something mechanical crackling in his ears.

“Bellamy?”

 _The radio._ The voice is static and wavering and a weak, but undoubtedly—“Clarke!”

This can’t be real. “Clarke, is that you?”

When he hears her confirmation (though shaky), he nearly dies from sheer joy. And then there’s a flutter of voices, all speaking over each other and he wants to cry, because he forgot that they’re all connected and _god,_ he can’t believe she’s alive.

After a few seconds of this, he waves at them to be quiet. “Clarke, how are you alive?”

“I woke up a minute or so after you guys left, and was able to make it to the lighthouse bunker. But Bellamy—” Her voice is so fragile, and breaking, and he’s sure it’s not just the connection, and his heart _aches. “_ I’m scared. I just, I really need you here right now.”

And so it goes. He feels something hot and wet slip down his cheek (tears) because he could be there right now. “I know.” And then, because he doesn’t know what else to say other than that he loves her and that he misses her and that he wishes he was in that stupid tiny little bunker that they’d only be able to survive in for a few months, he starts to tell her the story of Odysseus and Penelope.

It’s the only one he can think of right now, Homer.

He knows that everyone else on board is listening, but they haven’t said anything, so he trudges on, weaving the tale of the loyal and sharp Penelope, and the man who fought to get back to her.

 _God,_ he needs to get back to her.


	2. all the blisters

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "bellarke prompt: post separation dreams of Clarke"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> y’all should know that i almost wrote this prompt so that the entire episode and clarke getting left behind was just a dream and when he woke up she was in bed next to him on the ark. instead you got this.
> 
> unedited, as always. title from "bones" by dustin tebbutt

He doesn’t know when it all starts.

For the first nineteen months of their arrival, most of his time (more like every second, he could hear Harper saying) was spent working with the rest of the crew on their somewhat deteriorated space station, trying to get the water purification system up and running, trying to make sure the algae farm continues functioning properly, trying to fix every inch of this place so that he and his friends can survive for the next five years.

For those first five hundred and seventy two days, he’s able to keep her out of his mind, able to avoiding thinking of her aside from the occasional fleeting thought of “Clarke would do this _this_ way.” When stitching up Murphy’s hand after he slices open on _something_ in the bathroom (he won’t say), Bellamy briefly can hear her talking to herself as she did the same procedure on one of the delinquents (a small boy who was down there for stealing someone’s rations) and he was next to him, smoothing his hair down.

Those short-lived moments, and the day that marks one year passing since he’d last stepped foot on solid, dependable earth—since he’d last seen _her_ , left her to die—where he allows himself to mourn alone on one of the decks, the bottle of Baton in his hand; _those_ are the only instances where he allows himself to think about her for more than a few seconds.

So, while he’s not over her (who gets over a person who meant so much to you?), the empty part of his heart, the one that she used to fill, has numbed with the time, and he doesn’t hurt as much anymore. Or maybe that’s just what he tells himself.

And then the dreams began.

At first, it was just flashes of her hair in an otherwise mundane dream, where he’s in the medbay or the kitchen, and he hears her laughter from down the hallway, or catches blonde hair just out of the corner of his eye. Her voice will come from a nearby room, telling him that he _has such a good heart._ At one point, he swears he feels her lips against his own, chapped and sweet. He tries to remember that they’re dreams, and that’s all they are. Fantasies.

When he starts seeing _her,_ holding his hand, smiling softly, brushing her fingers against his temples, against his chest; _that’s_ when he starts napping more, so that _maybe,_ just maybe, he can see this dead girl again.  

Quietly, near what would be noon in Polis one day, he dozes off on one of the couches in the commons, and when he’s jostled awake, he finds Harper’s overly enthusiastic face above his, grinning like a madman, and when he raises his eyebrows in bemusement, she just pulls at his arm hurriedly.

“You’ve got to see this,” she offers as the only explanation for waking him up from an honestly fantastic nap, but he gets to his feet, and stumbles his way after her into office.

When he gets there, the room just feels _off._ He can’t put his finger on it, but then he notices Raven by their radio (which is weird, considering they agreed to not put effort into repairs for the communication systems until they were able to figure out how to get the algae farms to produce enough bio-oil for them to use as fuel), and she’s saying something into the dispatch.

It’s then that she turns her head over her shoulder, smiling so wide he doesn’t remember the last time he saw so much of her teeth, and waves him over, handing him the comm when he kneels on the floor next to her.

He presses the button. “Ark station. Who’s there?”

 “Bellamy?”

The voice is tinny, and it’s hard to tell. “Clarke?”

“It’s me, I’m alive.”

His stomach drops, and _god,_ he can’t believe she’s alive. She’s there, on the burning planet below him, and somehow she’s alive. “I just, I can’t believe it. How?”

“The satellite had to be manually aligned, so I had to do that instead. But, I guess the nightblood worked, because my helmet cracked when I was running back, and I woke up a few days later in the lab.”

His fingers tighten impossibly around the speaker, as if it’ll get him closer to her.

“But you’re okay, you’re safe?”

“Yeah, I’m fine. Becca kept a pretty well-stocked kitchen. Are you guys okay?”

“We’re good.” He pauses, but doesn’t let go of the button, because it’s then that a small piece of his heart aches, reminding him of why she’s not here with him. “Clarke, I’m so sorry for leaving you behind.”

A breath. “You did what you had to do, Bellamy.”

His chest hurts, but from then on, they talk about a variety of topics, mainly revolving around the state of the environment of the island (Clarke hasn’t ventured far from her home base of the lab), and the fact that Murphy keeps complaining about drinking his own piss.

After a few minutes of that—he thinks anyways; he hasn’t kept track of time, because it feels like both forever that he’s been talking to her and like a rush—she says, “I have to go now.”

His mind races. “Clarke, if we can’t get in contact with you again—”

“You will.”

The dispatch falls from his hand, something wet and warm against his cheek. Tears, he thinks. He hasn’t let himself cry over her since they’d gotten to the Ark.

And it’s then, fucking then, that he hears his named being called, and then everything goes black, feels someone’s hand on his arm, shaking him, and he blinks awake to find himself on the maroon velvet couch in the commons.

He doesn’t sleep that night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [send me prompts!](http://dmigod.tumblr.com/ask)

**Author's Note:**

> if you're wondering, echo will always be my choice of a villain.
> 
> anyways, if you want more, either leave suggestions in the comments (wink wink) or send them to my tumblr, [dmigod.](http://dmigod.tumblr.com/ask)


End file.
